ia9 



CELEBRATION 



OF THE 



100™ ANNIVERSARY 



OF THE 



ORGANIZATION OF THE 
TOWN OF RIVERHEAD, 
SUFFOLK COUNTY, N. Y., 



AT 



RIVERHEAD, 



July 4, 1892. 



f 



Printed by Resolution adopted at Annual 
Town Meeting, April 4th, 189-?. 



New York: 

The Republic Press. 

1894. 




Class V?^^ 



CELEBRATION 



OF THE 



100™ ANNIVERSARY 



OF THE 



ORGANIZATION OF THE 
TOWN OF RIVERHEAD, 
SUFFOLK COUNTY, N. Y., 



AT 



RIVERHEAD, 

July 4, 1892. 



Printed by Resolution adopted at Annual 
Town Meeting, April 4th, 1895. 



New York: 



CELEBRATION 



OF THE 



100™ ANNIVERSARY 



OF THE 



ORGANIZATlOl^ OF THE 
TOWN OF RIVERHEAD, 
SUFFOLK COUNTY, N. Y., 



AT 



RIVERHEAD 

July 4, 1892. 



f 



Printed by Resolution adopted at Annual 
Town Meeting, April 4th, 1893. 



New York: 
The Republic Press. 






GWi 



Je'( 



Riverhead's Centennial. 



At the annual Town Meeting of the Town of Riverhead, 
N. Y., held at the Town Hall, Tuesday, April 5, 1892, it 
was on motion adopted, that the town celebrate, on July 4, 
1892, the 1 00th anniversary of the organization of the town, 
and the Supervisor was empowered to appoint a committee to 
carry out the same; and in pursuance of this motion the fol- 
lowing notice was forwarded by Supervisor George F. Homan 
to the following named gentlemen : Nat. W. Foster, D. Henry 
Brown, Jonas Fishel, Orlando O. Wells, J. Henry Perkins, 
Frank H. Hill, Elijah Griswold, George F. Homan, Timothy 
M. Grif^ng, James H. Tuthill, Charles M. Blydenburgh, 
Oliver A. Terry, Benjamin F. Howell, William C. Ostrander, 
J. Martin Wagner, Alonzo P. Terry, George H. Skidmore, 
Joseph M. Belford, John Bagshaw. 

Riverhead, N. Y., April — , 1892. 

Dear Sir: — At our last Town Meeting, a resolution was 
presented, and unanimously adopted as follows: 

That Riverhead Town celebrate the looth anniversary of its 
formation on the 4th day of July next, and the Supervisor of 
the town was empowered to appoint a committee to carry out 
the same. In accordance with that resolution, and being de- 
sirous of the aid of our prominent citizens, and particularly the 
old residents of Riverhead Town, I have appointed you a mem- 
ber of such committee, and respectfully request your kind 
assistance toward making the celebration a success. Kindly 
attend at a meeting to be held May 5, 1892, at 7 :30 P. M., in 
the Town Hall. 

Yours respectfully, 

Geo. F. Homan, 

Supervisor. 



The meeting was held pursuant to the foregoing, and 
fifteen of the gentlemen attended. The Supervisor briefly 
stated the object therefor. Jonas Fishel was selected Chair- 
man, and Town Clerk John Bagshaw Secretary. 

Remarks were made by several gentlemen as to their views 
in order to make the celebration a success, which terminated 
in several motions being adopted, making the following per- 
sons members of the respective committees, viz. : 

Historical and otJier Addresses, 
James H. Tuthill, Timothy M. Griffing. 

Parade, 
Oliver A. Terry, J. Martin Wagner, 

George F. Roman. 

Finance, 

Jonas Fishel, Daniel R. Young, 

Timothy M. Griffing, Edward Hawkins, 

William C. Ostrander, Arthur H. Tuthill, 

Nat. W. Foster, Zachariah Hallock, 

Elijah Griswold, Simeon S. Hawkins, 

Edmund F. Tuthill, George L. Wells, 

D. Henry Brown, Alonzo M. Robinson, 

J. Henry Perkins, Albert B. Young, 

Robert Gosman, Jr., Merritt H. Smith, 

Albert S. Tuthill, Septer Luce. 

Fireivorks^ 
Orlando O. Wells, Frank H. Hill, 

Charles M. Blydenburgh. 

Mnsic, 
Alonzo P. Terry. 

At later meetings Dr. Henry P. Terry was selected 
Treasurer; Messrs. Homan, Wells, Tuthill and Foster were 
appointed Reception Committee; Messrs. Homan, Tuthill 



and Griffing elected Invitation Committee; J. Henry Perkins, 
Auditor; and Nat. W. Foster appointed to preside over the 
meeting, and Miss Minerva Mitchell was selected to read the 
Declaration of Independance. The Committee on Addresses 
reported that they had secured ex-County Clerk Orville B. 
Ackerly, formerly of Riverhead, and Prof. Joseph M. Belford, 
oi Riverhead, for the occasion. 

In addition to the numerous meetings of the General and 
other committees, a public meeting was called and held and 
finally the arrangements were considered completed and 
sufficient money raised to carry out successfully the cele- 
bration. 

Invitations were sent out inviting the presence of Wilmot 
M. Smith, County Judge; Benjamin H. Reeve, District At- 
torney; all the County Supervisors, Hon. Henry P. Hedges, 
Wm. S. Pelletreau, Rev. Dr. Epher Whitaker, Richard M. 
Bayles, the President and Secretary of the Long Island His- 
torical Society, George R. Howell, State Assistant Librarian ; 
Prof. Eben N. Horsford and Charles B. Moore, Esq. 

The day arrived (the weather was all that could be desired) 
and was practically given over to the affair in hand, most of 
the stores and business places being closed. Early in the 
morning the village was astir and soon wore a gala-day appear- 
ance, residences and business places being handsomely decorated 
with patriotic emblems and flags. 

The parade formed on Main Street near the railroad at lo 
A. M., and moved west to Osborn Avenue, up Osborn Avenue 
to Court Street, through Court to Grififing Avenue, up Grififing 
to Lincoln Avenue, through Lincoln to Roanoke Avenue, 
down Roanoke to Second Street, through Second to East 
Street, down East to First Street, through First to Roanoke, 
up Roanoke to Second, through Second to Griffing Avenue, 
down Griffing to Main Street, east along Main and disbanded 
at Bridge Street. At the head was Benjamin T. Davis, Grand 
Marshal. Then came the Greenport Brass Band, Leader 
Geehring, making a fine appearance in their handsome uni- 



forms, and pleasing all by their excellent music. Following; 
was Henry A. Barnum Post, G. A. R., Commander Thomas 
Britton ; then O. O. Howard Camp, Sons of Veterans, William 
C. Britton, Commander; Chief Oliver A. Terry of the Fire 
Department, Red Bird Engine Company No. i. Assistant 
Foreman Magee in charge, with machine; Washington Com- 
pany No. 2, Foreman James L. Millard; the portly forms of 
County Treasurer Perkins and Horatio F. Buxton at the head, 
and steamer; the engine of Rough and Ready Company No. 
3 (members not in line, many being in the march in other 
capacities). Quickstep Hook and Ladder Company No. 4, and 
truck, and a company of youngsters dragging the first 
engine owned in Riverhead. The apparatus were all gayly 
trimmed. 

The Riverhead Brass Band followed. Leader Hill, playing 
lively selections in good style ; then several young men on 
horseback, carriage containing Supervisor Homan, Town Clerk 
Bagshaw, County Clerk Fanning, Sheriff Darling, and ex- 
Sheriff Cooper; carriage containing Judge Tuthill, chairman of 
Reception Committee, Rev. Mr. Noble, of Greenport, J. M. 
Wagner and N. W. Foster; aged sleigh in which were seated 
Mrs. Everett Terry and Misses Fannie Terry, Mary Sayre and 
Lina Foster, dressed in old-time styles, with Fred. Reisdorph, 
representing "Uncle Sam," as driver; two box wagons filled 
with children; a wagon — Arthur H. Tuthill, of Jamesport, in 
ancient garb, driving — in which were seated two young ladies 
in costumes of many years agone, busily working a spinning, 
wheel ; citizens of the town in wagons. The parade w^as a 
creditable affair and was heartily applauded along the route. 

The public meeting was held in Riverhead Hall at 2 o'clock. 
The room was crowded. Upon the platform sat many of the 
town's representative men. Nat. W. Foster presided. The 
exercises were opened with prayer by Rev. Mr. Chalmers of 
the village Congregational Church. A choir of about thirty 
local singers, with Sidney H. Ritch as chorister and Prof. A. 
M. Tyte at the organ, excellently rendered a selection. Sec- 



retary Bagshaw read the following letters of acceptance and 

regret : 

Patchogue, N. Y., June 28, 1892. 
John Bagshaw, Esq. : 

Dear Sir : — I regret that previous engagements will pre- 
vent my attendance at your Centennial Anniversary. I have 
no doubt the occasion will be both pleasant and profitable. 
The Town of Riverhead is the connecting link between the east- 
ern and western towns of our County, and that she will con- 
tinue to join them together in the future, as in the past, is the 
hearty wish of the loyal sons of Suffolk. 

Yours truly, 

W. M. Smith. 

New York State Library, 

Albany, June 29, 1892. 
Mr. John Bagshaw, 

Secretary of the General Committee^ etc. : 
Dear Sir: — Your kind invitation to me to be present at 
celebration of the Centennial of the formation of the Town of 
Riverhead, on the 4th of July next, was received this morning. 
I regret to say I had made arrangements to be elsewhere 
engaged, and, therefore, can only send regrets that I cannot 
be with you on so interesting occasion. I trust you will do as 
all the other towns have done, send the State Library a pub- 
lished copy of the proceedings. 

Respectfully yours, 

George Rogers Howell. 

Southampton, June 29, 1892. 
Mr, John Bagshaw, Secretary: 

Dear Sir: — Please accept my thanks for your invitation 
to be present at the Centennial Anniversary of the formation 
of your town on the 4th. 

It is hardly probable that I can come, but I will do so if 
possible. 

Trusting you will have a good time, 

I am, yours truly, 

James H. Pierson. 

SouTHOLD, June 29, 1892. 
John Bagshaw, Esq. : 

Dear Sir: — Most gratefully appreciated is your kind 
invitation to be present at the Centennial Anniversary of the 



formation of the Town of Riverhead, on the 4th of July next. 
It is my purpose to attend the pubHc meeting which you will 
hold at 2 P. M. 

Thankfully yours, 

Epher Whitaker. 

Kings Park, June 30, 1892. 
John Bagshaw, Esq., Riverhead, N. Y. : 

Dear Sir-. — Your kind invitation at hand. Am sorry to 
say I cannot come on account of a prior engagement. 

However, you have my best wishes that you may have a 
rousing good time. 

Thanking you, I am yours 

Very truly, 

B. F. Curtis. 

Babylon, L. I., June 30, 1892. 
John Bagshaw, Esq. : 

Your very cordial invitation to attend the Centennial An- 
niversary of the Town of Riverhead is duly received. 

I regret that a previous engagement will prevent my accept- 
ance, for I have no doubt that those present will have a royal 
good time, and the celebration will be worthy the good old 
Town of Riverhead. 

Yours truly, 

Richard Higbie. 

Bridge Hampton, 30th June, 1892. 
John Bagshaw, Esq. : 

Dear Sir: — Your invitation that I attend the coming 
Centennial Celebration of the formation of the Town of River- 
head is received, and I am obliged therefor. 

It would give me great pleasure to attend the celebration 
and I intend to do so if my health permits, but that is un- 
certain. 

I am yours truly, 

H. P. Hedges. 

Springs, L. I., July i, 1892. 
John Bagshaw, Esq. : 

Dear Sir : — Accept thanks for the invitation duly received 
to attend Riverhead's first Centennial Celebration. I regret 
exceedingly that I cannot be present with you. I extend con- 
gratulations, however, that this "Chip of the (South) old 



block," which had been fashioned into the centre pin of old 
Suffolk machinery, can call attention to its career with so much 
honest pride. 

Very truly yours, 

Geo. a. Miller. 

Mr. John Bagshaw: 

Dear Sir: — Please accept for your committee my thanks 
for your cordial invitation to be present at the Centennial 
Anniversary of the formation of your town. I regret that 
circumstances, over which I have no control, render it im- 
possible for me to be present with you on that day. 

Hoping that you may be favored with a perfect day and 
that your celebration may prove a most gratifying success, 

I remain yours, 

Byron Griffing. 
Shelter Island Heights, July i, 1892. 

Patchogue, N. Y., July [, 1892. 
John Bagshaw, Esq. : 

Dear Sir:- — Many thanks for your kind invitation to be 
present at the Centennial Anniversary of the formation of 
your Town of Riverhead, on July 4th. 

It would afford me pleasure to be present, but visiting 
friends, who will be in Patchogue over the 4th, will claim my 
attention, so that I hardly feel justified in being absent on 
that day. 

Yours very truly, 

John M. Price. 

Middle Island, N. Y., July 2, 1892. 
Mr. John Bagshaw, Secretary: 

Dear Sir: — Your invitation to attend the Centennial 
•Celebration of the organization of Riverhead Town is received 
with grateful appreciation of the honor thereby conferred upon 
me. I have always felt a deep interest in Riverhead as a model 
town in many of its points of character, and should take great 
pleasure in attending the celebration. Circumstances may 
favor my doing so. 

I am, yours respectfully, 

Richard M. Bayles. 

After another selection from the choir. Miss Minerva 
Mitchell read the immortal Declaration of Independence. The 



historical paper which followed, after music by the band, pre- 
pared and read by Orville B. Ackerly, Esq., now a resident of 
Yonkers, N. Y., is here given in full: 

Mr. Chairman, Ladies and Genilenien: 

We have been passing through a period of centennial an- 
niversaries, the first in our history as a nation. Beginning 
with the celebration of the Declaration of our Independance 
at Philadelphia in 1876, which must always remain the greatest 
event in our national life, our birth ; hardly a week, certainly 
not a month, has passed, that has not witnessed in some part 
of the territory comprising the original thirteen States the 
centennial anniversary of some important event: the battles 
on land or sea, victories or defeats of the Revolutionary War, 
the final surrender of Cornwallis, the evacuation of New York, 
the adoption of the Constitution, the inauguration of President 
Washington, and like events, so that, as much as possible, we 
have lived over again the stormy scenes of our early history, 
and we appreciate more than ever before what it cost to make 
us a free and independent nation. In many places, celebration 
of events that took place two hundred years ago have occurred. 
The county celebrated its bi-centennial nine years ago, and 
the towns of Southold and Southampton only two years ago 
rejoiced over the fact that they had lived two hundred and 
fifty years. Last autumn the churches at Upper Aquebogue 
and Baiting Hollow invited their friends to enjoy with them in 
the festivities that appropriately marked the conclusion of one 
hundred years of useful existence, and now the Town of River- 
head finding itself one hundred years old, proposes to cele- 
brate the fact, selecting the glorious national anniversary day, 
that the fires of local pride and national patriotism may mingle 
and make brighter and more memorable the happy occasion. 
Next year this notable period of anniversaries may be said 
to close with the celebration of the greatest event known to 
modern times, that which made all the rest possible — the 
discovery of a new world by Columbus. Occurring somewhat 



tardily, it may be all the more successful. No lover of his 
kind and of his country but rejoices over the fact that the 
public enters so heartily into the spirit of these celebrations. 

Let us consider briefly the condition of our own country 
and the world at large at the time this town was organized. 
The new constitution was almost an experiment, for less than 
four years had passed since it had been made the supreme law 
of the land. No addition had been made to our territory. 
Maine was still a province of Massachusetts, and Vermont had 
just been made a State only to prevent it from any longer being 
debatable ground between New York and New Hampshire. 
The vast valley of the Mississippi was a part of France, while 
Florida and the immense region north of the Rio Grande were 
still under the rule of Spain. Thanks to enterprising and in- 
trepid explorers, we to-day know a great deal about Central 
Africa. But the generation that lived when this town was 
established knew nothing of the unknown land beyond the 
Mississippi. In all maps of the world at that time the region 
was a blank. It was, of course, supposed that there must be 
rivers and mountains there, and so they were put down appar- 
ently at random and by guess-work. It was the custom of 
geographers to people these unknown wastes with strange and 
uncouth animals, or monsters rather, which makes one of the 
poets of that day declare, 

"Geographers on Afric maps 

With savage pictures fill their gaps; 

O'er uninhabitable downs 

Place elephants for want of towns." 

And it was so on the maps of America. The "western 
country " meant then the middle of the State of New York. 
New York was a respectable sized city of about 30,000 inhab- 
itants, where everybody knew everybody, and on the east end 
of Long Island there were many who had heard of the great 
city and longed to see it, but "died without the sight," for 
want of courage enough to brave the long and dangerous jour- 
ney. George Washington was serving his first term as Pres- 



ident, and "His Excellency, George Clinton, Esq.," was our 
Governor. The great men of state were Alexander Hamilton, 
Aaron Burr, Robert R. Livingston, John Jay and Gouverneur 
Morris; De Witt Clinton was but a young lawyer only five 
years out of college. Fulton had not yet made the dream of 
his life a reality ; the sloop on the river and the stage coach 
on the land were the means of conveyance, and the only 
means. Political parties had no platforms, at least no written 
ones, but the dividing line between the Federalists and Repub- 
licans were as strongly drawn as any party lines at the present 
time. The followers of Jefferson and Burr denounced Wash- 
ington and Hamilton in terms which would be considered out- 
rageous even to the political rancour of to-day, while they in 
return were accused in most vehement language of a base con- 
spiracy to destroy religion, the Bible and all that respectability 
then held dear, and to emulate the Jacobins of France in their 
deeds of blood. George HI. was still the King of Great Bri- 
tain, and destined to continue so for a score of years to come. 
Louis XVL and his ill-fated Queen, Marie Antoinette, were 
still the rulers of France, but only in name, for the time was 
brief indeed before they would leave the palace for the prison, 
and the prison for the scaffold. Robespierre was but a young 
attorney, and had not yet made his name infamous for all 
coming time. Mirabeau, whose power and political genius 
might have turned the tide of revolution into more peaceful 
channels, had but lately passed away. The French philoso- 
phers, who had done their best (or their worse) to destroy all 
faith in religion and the Bible, and had conjured up in their 
place atheism and anarchy, were destined soon to be among 
the first victims of the fiends they had raised. Among the 
spectators of the events that "passed with giant steps" was a 
young man maned Napoleon Bonaparte, then twenty-three years 
old, a captain of artillery, who was shortly to change the map 
of Europe and make the earth shake with the tread of his 
armies. Wellesley, afterwards the Iron Duke, Napoleon's 
conqueror to be, was twenty-two years of age and preparing 



for service in India. Spain was then but a shadow of the 
power that had been, but even then how vast was its territory. 
Prussia had become powerful through the mighty mihtary 
genius of Frederick the Great, but what is now the German 
Empire was then but a group of petty States powerless for 
want of union. Italy, partly ruled as "the States of the 
Church," partly under independent rulers, and all over- 
shadowed by Austria. The only place in Europe where 
freedom was enshrined was on the mountain top of Switzer- 
land. Turkey was not then the "sick man of Europe," but 
a power fully capable of taking care of itself. Greece was but 
a name on the map; it had its ruins and its records of the 
past, nothing else. It now seems hardly credible that the 
piratical fleets of Algiers, Tunis and Tripoli were then the 
terror of the seas, and the most powerful nations of Christen- 
dom were compelled to pay them tribute as a protection for 
their commerce. It was the beginning of a new order of 
things when the young nation beyond the Atlantic returned 
as an answer to their demands, "Millions for defense, but not 
one cent for tribute." Lastly there was Russia, vast in its 
extent of land, great in the numbers of its people, but as a 
nation just emerging from barbarism, and with a young Alex- 
ander for an Emperor. We might add as an item of interest, 
that when this town was established, the first newspaper on 
Long Island was but a year old, Frothingha7n s Long Island 
Herald, established at Sag Harbor, May lO, 1791. 

Seventeen hundred and ninety-two seems to have been a 
year prolific of events worth noting. Kentucky, created a State 
out of Virginia's large territoiy, was that year admitted to the 
Union, becoming the fifteenth State. The manufacturing city of 
Paterson, N. J., was founded that year and is now celebrating 
the fact. A Boston captain, cruising in the Pacific, by acci- 
dent discovered the largest river on the coast, and named it 
after his ship, the Columbia. The New York Stock Exchange 
was started that year; coal gas was first used as an illuminant, 
and the canal system of this State originated in 1792. And 

13 



down at East Hampton, in a very humble dwelling, on the 9th 
day of June, in that year, to the first teacher of Clinton Aca- 
demy, the first academy in this State, there was born a son, 
who, in a wandering, checkered career covering sixty years, 
as clerk, actor, manager, playwriter and diplomat, achieved 
nothing else of note, but made himself famous as long as the 
English tongue shall last, as the author of "Home, Sweet 
Home" — John Howard Payne. 

On January ii, 1792, there was presented to the Assembly, 
then in session in New York City, the petition of Peter Reeves 
and others that the town of Southold be divided into two 
towns. At the same time, the petition of John Wells, Justice 
of the Peace, and others praying for a postponement of such 
action by the Legislature, until the next session, was read. 
Benjamin Horton, Jr., Henry Herrick and others also prayed 
for an Act authorizing town meetings to be held alternately 
at the old Town Meeting House (the First Presbyterian 
Church at Southold) and the Aquebogue Meeting House. 
The last refers doubtless to the old church, 24x33, which then 
stood on the south side of the road, nearly opposite the present 
church at Upper Aquebogue. The petitions were referred to 
the appropriate committee, which reported on the i6th of the 
following month in favor of an Act dividing the town, and the 
Assembly concurred. The Act passed the House March 3, 
and passed the Senate five days later. The law was approved 
by the Council of Revision, a feature in our first constitution, 
and Riverhead became a town March 13, 1792. These 
petitions cannot be found, and we are left to surmise the 
reasons for and against the change. No matter what they 
were, the town became a fact, and she has no doubt as to the 
date of her birth, unlike her mother, Southold, and her aunt, 
Southampton ; for these dear old sisters, having long passed the 
period when ladies expect to be thought young, are now claim- 
ing, each that she is older than the other. On this question 
Riverhead is neutral ; in fact, we do not want it settled ; it 
keeps alive interest and stimulates inquiry, benefiting us by 

14 



increasing our knowledge of the beginnings of history on the 
east end of Long Island. 

The first town meeting was held at the Court House (the 
old Court House) April 3, 1792, and Daniel Wells was chosen 
Supervisor; Josiah Reeve, Town Clerk; John C. Terry, Joseph 
Wells and Benjamin Terry, Assessors; Jeremiah Wells and 
Spencer Dayton, Highway Commissioners; Deacon Daniel 
Terry, Zachariah Hallock and Daniel Edwards, Overseers of 
the Poor; Nathan Youngs, Eleazer Luce, Rufus Youngs, John 
Corwin, Zophar Mills, Peter Reeve and Merrit Howell, Over- 
seers of Highways; Sylvanus Brown, Collector, and David 
Brown, Abel Corwin and Benjamin Horton, Constables. These 
names sound familiar; for although all long since dead, others 
bearing the same names, certainly same surnames, are among 
us to-day. In later years new and strange names have ap- 
peared on the town tickets, like Perkins, Millard, Stackpole, 
Homan and Bagshaw, but only because the people are hospit- 
able, unselfish and like to encourage immigration. Daniel 
Wells, the first Supervisor, was re-elected the next year, but 
died before completing the term of of^ce. Josiah Reeve con- 
tinued to be Town Clerk for four years, and was succeeded 
by John Woodhull (afterwards Judge John Woodhull), who 
held the ofifice for eleven years. 

In the early days the circumstances and conditions of 
establishing a new village or settlement were very different 
from those of the present time. The main points to be 
considered then were: How near to a bay or harbor?. Is 
there plenty of meadow land? This was a most important 
consideration, for the crop of meadow hay which, without 
care or cultivation, came with annual regularity, was a thing 
of the greatest value. And last, not by any means least, 
"Is there a stream for a mill?" How greatly times have 
changed may be known by the fact that when a country 
place is now spoken of as a desirable place of residence the 
very first interrogatory is, " How far from a railroad station?" 

The main settlement of Setauket, the parent hive of the 

IS 



town of Brookhaven, soon sent out small swarms of inhabitants 
to establish new villages. The native Indian inhabitants have 
a right to the soil, which, to their credit be it said, the settlers 
of the towns in Suffolk County never failed to recognize, and 
under date of June lo, 1694, we find that the Indian Sachem, 
"John Mayhew, doth freely give, grant and surrender, unto 
the Committee of Connecticut for settling business on Long 
Island, for the use of the town of Seatalk, the feed and timber 
of all ye lands from ye Old Man's to the Wading River." 
This was signed by the Sachem and duly witnessed by John 
Cooper and Richard Howell, who were prominent residents 
of the village of Southampton. This John Mayhew, an 
Indian with an English name, must have been a powerful 
chief and well recognized as one in authority, for we find him 
giving to the original purchasers of Moriches their right and 
title to the land, and his name is connected with other trans- 
fers on the south side of the land. 

In 1669 and 1686 the settlers of Setauket obtained from 
the Royal Governor patents for "all the lands, bays, harbors 
and streams between the Stony Brook River on the west and 
the head of Wading River or Red Creek on the east," " and 
from the head of the Wading River their eastern bounds 
were to be a straight line running due north to the sound and 
due south to the sea or main ocean." Our first knowledge, 
then, of the Wading River and the settlement near it, finds it 
as a part of the town of Brookhaven. The spot which was 
then designated as " the head of the Wading River," was 
marked by a large pepperidge tree which after standing for 
more than a century and a half fell to decay, and the site it 
occupied was in 1840 marked by a stone bearing the initial 
letters of the adjoining towns. It stands at the northwest cor- 
ner of the church lot and will doubtless remain for long years 
to come. The land at the Wading River having been fairly 
bought, next comes the settlement, and as the record states, 
" At a lawful town meeting 17 November, 1671, it was voted 
and agreed upon that there shall be a village at the Wading 

16 



River or thereabouts of eight families or eight men. It was 
granted and agreed upon by a vote that Daniel Lane, Jr., shall 
have a lotment at the Wading River convenient to the water 
for his calling (they do not tell us what that calling was), and 
at the same time allotments were granted to Thomas Jenness, 
Elias Bayles, Joseph Longbottom and Thomas Smith, and 
Francis Muncy had a lot granted there with the rest upon con- 
dition that he lived there himself! " Was this a shrewd dodge 
to get Francis Muncy (who may have been an undesirable 
neighbor) as far off from Setauket as they could, or was it an 
equally shrewd dodge on his part to get a lot free without ever 
having to live on it? These are questions upon which history 
throws no light and we cannot assume to answer them. From 
that time the village was an established fact. The Wading 
River is cetainly the smallest stream ever dignified with that 
title, for its entire length from mouth to fountain head cannot 
much exceed a mile, but the place has always been one of the 
most important portions of our town, though comparatively 
far greater in the past than in the present ; but that it will have 
a prosperous future no one who sees its natural beauties can 
doubt. 

In 1675 there is another Indian grant to the patentees of 
Brookhaven, ratifying and confirming all former purchases of 
land between Stony Brook and the Wading River, and by 
the same grant all lands not before purchased were conveyed 
to Richard WoodhuU. This grant was signed by the Sachem, 
John Mayhew, and his associates Masstuse, Nascenge and 
Achedouse. On November 23, 1675, Richard WoodhuU re- 
linquishes all the said lands to the towns and under the same 
date we find the following : "At a town meeting was voted 
and given to Richard WoodhuU a farm at the Wading River, 
that is to say, ten acres upland where it is most convenient to 
set a house on, and three score and ten acres more of upland 
where the said Richard WoodhuU shall choose it, lying together 
adjacent to the said Wading River, and half the meadow that 
belongs to us this side of the creek, being divided, and to draw 

17 



cuts for it, and this is given in consideration of land that was 
given by the Indians and assigned over to the towns." 

To locate ancient landmarks is one of the duties, and we 
need not say one of the greatest pleasures, of the antiquarian, 
and our researches lead us to believe that the place mentioned 
as the " ten acres where it is most convenient to set a house 
up " is the present homestead of Charles Woodhull, the 
descendant in the eighth generation from Brookhaven's most 
illustrious founder. 

On May 4, 1708, we find that upon application of John 
Roe, Jr., in behalf of himself and others of the Wading 
River, that "they may have liberty to set up a grist mill at 
the Red Brook there, and to take up — acres of land adjoin- 
ing to it for the use of the said mill or miller, on condition 
they set up a mill as aforesaid and support the same con- 
tinually." The Red Brook, so called from the color of the 
sands over which it flows, still "goes on forever," and the 
mill, under a long succession of various owners, still grinds as 
it did in days of yore. How Wading River came to be a 
part of Southold is a curious episode in our local history. It 
seems that about 1708, one John Rogers, who had been a 
townsman of Brookhaven, had removed to the town of South- 
old and by various misfortunes had become a public charge. 
Southold claimed, and with justice, that the cost of his 
support was chargeable to the neighboring town whence he 
came. A letter was sent by the authorities of Southold calling 
^attention to the matter, and on October 7, 1708, a reply was 
ordered to be sent. This elicited another letter from Southold^ 
and on December 9, another reply was sent. The evidence 
was plainly against Brookhaven, for, at a Trustee meeting in 
June, 1709, we find the following resolution: 

" Upon the application of James Reeve, in behalf of the town of Southold in 
reference to defray the charge of keeping John Rogers, it was agreed upon between 
the said James Reeve on the one part in the part of Southold and the Trustees of 
Brookhaven on the other part, that the town of Brookhaven shall be acquitted and 
fully discharged from all charges whatever that now is or shall hereafter be con- 
cerning the said John Rogers, his keeping or care, on the condition that the town 



of Brookhaven do assign unto the town of Southold all their patent right of the 
land and meadow on the east side of the Wading River, and also pay unto the 
said James Reeve, four pounds in current money at his house, for the use of the 
town of Southold, at or before the 29th day of September next ensuing the date 
hereof." 

Now we think our readers will, one and all, agree that 
Southold, through James Reeve, its agent, made a pretty- 
profitable bargain, and this is the first instance on record 
where a pauper added to the wealth of a town. And so it 
happened that the due north line from the pepperidge tree to 
the sound ceased to be a boundary and the river itself became 
our western bounds. 

Our limits will not permit us to dwell too long on the 
ancient history of this village; let it suffice to mention some of 
the names of men who were prominent, and of places that 
were well known localities at the time when our town was 
•established. We might say that from the earliest settlement 
the Woodhull family were the bone and sinew of the village. 
Here was the homestead of Joshua Woodhull, who died in 
1787 at the age of fifty-two years. He was well known here 
during the days of the Revolution, and on the top of his house 
was built a lookout from which the watcher could descry and 
give timely warning if marauding bands from British vessels 
on the sound were seen approaching the shore. Not far from 
him, on the present homestead of Mrs. Thomas Coles, and 
what was in the very early days the home of Robert Terry, 
lived his son, Nathaniel Woodhull, a true and worthy repre- 
sentative of a noble race, a strong supporter of the church, a^ 
good, substantial citizen, and in all the relations of life a use- 
ful and honored man. He was the maternal grandfather of 
our worthy chairman, Nathaniel Woodhull Foster, and from 
whom he derives his honored name. On the east side of the 
street, in the centre of the village, was the homestead and ex- 
tensive farm of Major Frederick Hudson, a wealthy and influ- 
ential citizen, but of Tory proclivities, and the officers of the 
British army found a warm welcome at his house. His son, 
Oliver Hudson, sold the estate to Zophar Mills, who was one 

19 



of the largest land owners in the town. To all lovers of local 
history there is a peculiar interest connected with this farm, 
from the fact that it was the early home of the famous Indian 
preacher, Paul Cuffee, who was the bound servant of Major 
Hudson till his twenty-first year. Strange change of circum- 
stances. The grave of the master is somewhere unmarked and 
unknown in a dense thicket of weeds and briars. The grave 
of the servant, fenced and guarded with pious care, by the 
roadside at Good Ground, is visited by hundreds who revere 
his virtues and honor his name. Further east is the well- 
known homestead of Zophar Miller, whose son, Sylvester, and 
grandson, Elihu, are names "whom not to know argues a 
Riverheader unknown." In front 'of this house, and a few 
feet north of the road, stood the old meeting house built 
about 1785. It stood till 1838, when it was sold and re- 
moved, and is now a barn on the premises of Alonzo Hulse, 
about two and a half miles east of the village. When the 
new church was built in 1857 it was Zophar Miller who gave 
the lot for the new edifice. It was in the house of the Miller 
family that the post-ofifice was kept for sixty-one years. It 
was removed in 1886 to its present location. One of the con- 
spicuous features of the place is the ancient house of Stephen 
Homan (of an old East-Hampton family), who came here in 
the latter part of the last century, married a daughter of 
Zophar Mills, and was store-keeper, tavern-keeper and farmer. 
A brown tombstone tells us he died in i8i6at the age of forty- 
nine. His son, Benjamin Homan, who never tires of talking 
of the past, inherits his name and place. There, too, in old 
times, was Isaac Reeve, a noted boatman and great judge and 
prognosticator of wind and weather. For aught we know he 
may have been a descendant of James Reeve who drove so 
sharp a bargain for the town. And also Nathaniel Tuthill, a 
well known citizen, and as one of the old residents said, "a. 
mighty smart man," and father of our honored townsman, 
Hon. James H. Tuthill. What shall we say of Jonathan 
Worth, who for long years ran the mill, and then left it to his 



son David, who sold it to a company consisting of the minister. 
Partial Terry, Deacon Nathaniel Tuthill, Deacon Nathaniel 
Woodhull and Deacon Luther Brown. Church and State 
might be separate, but church and mill were pretty closely con- 
nected in those days. The sentiment of the people may be 
imagined when we learn that when Washington was a candi- 
date for re-election to the Presidency he had only three votes 
in Wading River, and these were cast by Rev. David Wells, 
Stephen Homan and Benjamin Worth. New York took no 
part in the election of the first President. 

The changes which are apparent in every part of Long 
Island, are especially evident in the relative importance of vil- 
lages in the present compared with the past. At the time when 
this town was established let us suppose a stranger had asked,. 
" What is your most important place? ' The answer might 
have been, " Wading River or Aquebogue," but it most 
assuredly would not have been " Riverhead." Li the olden 
time to live on the post road had a certain advantage. There 
would always be more or less passing. The stage coach with 
its weekly or semi-weekly mail was the only communication 
with the outside world, and its arrival would be looked for with 
an interest which we can now scarcely realize. The taverns at 
intervals of a few miles with their swinging signs announcing- 
"Accommodations for Man and Beast," were welcome sights 
to the belated traveler. But the greater part of the people did 
not travel; many of them scarcely ever went beyond the 
bounds of their native village, and it is safe to say that hun- 
dreds lived, and lived to a good old age, who never saw any- 
thing outside of Suffolk County. The foundation for a village 
was a fertile soil where good crops could be raised. Means of 
communication with other villages were of little importance. As 
one old man expressed it, "A place is made to stay in, not go 
away from." It was the boast of some old-fashioned farmers 
that they did not go off their farm any day of the week ex- 
cept Sunday. The railroad changed all this. The whole sec- 
tion of country in the neighborhood of Riverhead was known 



to the old settlers by the name of Occobog, a name common to 
both sides of the river, and meaning in the Indian language, 
" the place at the head of the bay, or the cove place." Pre- 
vious to 1659, John Tucker, a very prominent man in the early 
days, and who was dignified with the title of Deacon, Captain 
and Esquire at a time when they meant something, presented 
a petition for the the privilege of building a saw-mill within the 
town "bounds near the head of the river. It was granted with 
liberty to "cut all sorts of timber," but with the condition 
that he should "cut no more oak than fell in the common 
track of getting pine and cedar, which was the chief induce- 
ment of getting a mill there to saw," This would seem to in- 
dicate that oak was comparatively scarce. He also asked for 
" ten acres of land for himself and such partners as he should 
take in to himself," which was granted. He seems to have 
found a partner in the person of Joseph Horton, for on Febru- 
ary 7, 1659, we find that "John Tucker with Joseph Horton 
desire the five men to enlarge the grant to the effect that they 
should have the privilege of building the saw-mill and of cutting 
timber for twenty-one years without molestation, nor any in- 
habitant to set up another mill by them." This also was 
granted on condition of their completing the mill within three 
years. 

A writer in the Genealogical and Biographical Record (Oct., 
1882) claims that Joseph Carpenter of Maschete Cove, Long 
Island, who built a saw and fulling mill in 1677, " was the 
first man on Long Island, New York, Connecticut or New 
Jersey, to set up a saw-mill run by water power," but here 
was a mill running more than fifteen years before, and the 
credit of being the first to establish a mill of this kind must 
now be given to John Tucker and Joseph Horton and to River- 
head. Tucker lived here in 1665 and was no doubt the first 
settler, but we cannot be certain of the exact location of his 
house. The town of Southampton, on April 14, 1693, granted 
to John Wick, " serge dresser," " the use of the stream called 
the Little River, on condition of setting up a fulling mill, and 



22 



fulling cloth for that town and Southold." It is doubtful if 
he complied with the conditions, for two years later we find 
that Southampton voted that John Parker and his heirs and 
assigns should have the stream and the privileges granted to 
John Wick, on condition of his building a good fulling mill, 
and that he should full cloth there "forever." John Parker 
also had land granted to him in 1700 to build a house on, and 
he probably did build a temporary residence at that time, but 
in 17 1 3 he built a far more substantial mansion, which is yet 
standing on the south side of the river, and which in after years 
passed into the hands of his son-in-law, Wm. Albertson, and 
continued in his family for three or four generations. Since 
then this house was owned and occupied by the Sweezy family 
and is now the residence of Sylvester H, Woodhull. On May 
15, 171 5, we find that " the Justices of Suffolk County met at 
Parker's to ascertain the amount of arrears of taxes." 

All the lands of Peconic River which are included in the 
village are a part of the original division of the lands of South- 
old, called the second Division of Aquebank lands. The lots 
were of large extent and ran from the river to the sound. In 
171 1 John Parker purchased from John Tucker, a grandson of 
the original John Tucker who died in 1690, one of the original 
lots containing 406 acres, bounded west by land of Widow 
Margaret Cooper and east by land of John Parker, which seems 
to have been another original lot of the same size, and which 
he had bought from its former owner. These two lots, with a 
lot of Widow Cooper on the west, embrace the entire business 
portion of Riverhead. 

In January, 1727, about a month before his death, John 
Parker gave a deed of gift to his daughter Abigail and her 
husband, Joseph Wickham, Jr., for their lives and then to her 
heirs, for all his land north of the river, and this tract in course 
of time came into possession of Parker Wickham, their eldest 
son and heir-at-law, whose loyalist proclivities caused his 
estate to be confiscated after the Revolution and sold to Na- 
thaniel Norton, who sold a part of it to Stephen Jagger, and 

23 



it is well known in recent years as the " J agger farm." There 
t are missing links in the chain of title which more extended' 
investigation may supply ; but it seems as if at some time pre- 
vious to 1727 a tract of 130 acres on the western part of this 
land had been disposed of to other parties, for in 1753 Thomas 
Fanning sold John Grififing " a tract of land at a place called 
Acaboug, bounded north and east by the lands of Abigail 
Wickham, south by and with Peconick river, together with the 
dwelling thereon, so far as the saw-mill, and west by the land 
of Qhristopher Young, containing by estimates 130 acres, 
reserving one-half acre of land at and about the place where 
his mother lies buried, with free passage in and to the 
same." This burial place, doubtless the first in the village, is 
situated just north of and adjoining the stable on the lot of 
Mrs. Louisa Howell on the east side of Grififing Avenue and 
next south of the railroad. The dwelling house mentioned is 
the first of which we have any positive knowledge in the vil- 
lage, and the Long Island House now occupies its site. The 
deed evidently includes the stream. 

This John Griffing, the first of his name to settle in River- 
head, was a prominent Whig. At the request of his neighbors 
he became a "tea-spy," as they called men whose business it 
was to detect and prevent the use of tea and other imported 
articles upon which the English Government levied duties of 
the inhabitants here. When the British forces got possession 
of Long Lsland after their victory over the Colonist forces at 
Brooklyn in August, 1766, Mr. Griffing and many others fled 
to Connecticut. He died there October 18, 1777, in the 
sixty-first year of his age. As he died without will his 
property descended to his son and namesake. The mother 
of the late Charles and Gamaliel Vail was one of his daughters, 
and we well remember hearing them comment on the injustice 
of the English law of primogeniture. His grave is at a place 
called Cromwell, on the west side of the Connecticut River, 
about three miles above Middletown. Near it is the grave of 
Martha L'Hommedieu, the mother of Ezra L'Hommedieu,, 

24 



one of the most prominent men in the State lOO years ago, 
and a resident of Southold until his death in i8i i. The land 
next west of the Griffing farm, the original lot of Widow Mar- 
garet Cooper, descended to her grandchildren, the children of 
Stephen Bailey and Elnathan Topping of Southampton. Upon 
a division of her estate the land above mentioned fell to the 
latter, beyond which we cannot trace it, but in 1753 it was 
owned wholly or in part by Christopher Young. For long 
years the place was isolated from the rest of the town. No 
direct road connected it with the "Middle Road," then the 
principal thoroughfare. The fulling mill, the grist mill and 
the Court House and jail were the only things to call any of 
the people from the neighboring regions, and the people whose 
business called them there did not come to stay. It was 
recognized as a very central locality in the county, and this is 
doubtless the reason why the place was selected for the county 
seat. On November 25, 1727, an Act was passed by the 
Governor and Provincial Legislature to enable the Justices of 
the Peace in the County of Suffolk to build a "County 
House and Prison." Riverhead was chosen as the most 
suitable place, and the building was erected and the first 
court held in it on March 27, 1729. Previous to that the jail 
seems to have been the basement or cellar of the old church at 
Southold. 

On July 12, 1729, an Act was passed reciting that "there 
had been of late some dispute among the Supervisors of the 
County of Suffolk," and hence it was enacted "that the place 
and time of the Supervisors' meeting forever hereafter should 
be at the Court House on the last Tuesday in the month of 
October, and that their pay should be 9 shillings (or$i.i2 1-2) 
a day." For a period of more than seventy-five years the 
place remained stationary, and from the best authorities we 
learn that for nearly thirty years after the Revolution there 
were but four houses, the Griffing tavern, Joseph Wickham's 
house, afterwards that of David Jagger. David Horton lived 
in the Court House and kept the jail. Stephen Griffing oc- 

25 



cupied the place late of Dr. Thomas Osborn, and besides 
these there was the old Parker house, then owned by William 
Albertson on the other side of the river. It may perhaps be 
needless to state that till within comparatively recent times 
the village was surrounded by a dense forest. One of our 
best known citizens, John P. Terry, says: "When a boy (sixty 
years ago), I set snares and caught quails where the house of 
Hon. James H. Tuthill now stands. All the land north of 
Main Street was covered with woods, except in a few spots." 
He adds as a curious illustration of the changes in social life: 
"Sixty-one years ago my father died, one of the well-known 
men of the place. His funeral expenses were a dollar and a 
half. The remains, and the mourners, the members of his 
family, all rode to the grave in the same box wagon. The 
grave was dug by neighbors who volunteered ; and this was 
the general custom at the time." He adds: "I saw ten deer, 
which had been caught in the woods south of the river, con- 
fined in a pen where Riverhead Hall now stands. The first 
store was in the northeast corner of the house of the late Judge 
Miller. It was kept by Stephen Grifflng, who afterwards 
moved to West Hampton. Seventy years ago, Jasper or 
'Jep' Vail lived at P^iverhead, but kept a store some miles 
east, opposite the Steeple Church, thinking that a far better 
location for business than this place. He had some peculiar 
methods: for instance, if a customer tendered a dollar bill for 
fifty cents worth of goods he would cut the bill in two, keep 
one-half and tell the customer to bring the other half some 
other time, and he would take it for fifty cents. He thus 
secured that man's custom for so much trade anyhow, and 
then he would paste the two halves together. The use of 
liquor was general. AH storekeepers kept it and everybody 
■drank it, and to expect a workingman to live without rum 
was the same as expecting him to live without air." For 
nearly a century and a half the Griffing family had been part 
and parcel of the place, and none have been more closely con- 
nected with its business and social interests. One of our 

26 



largest hotels, kept by a member of the family, stands on the 
land bought by his ancestor in 1753, and one of the finest 
streets is justly named in their honor. Dr. Thomas Osborn 
was the first physician in the village and is well remembered 
by the older citizens. He commenced practice very early in 
the present century, and died here in 1849. Sixty years ago 
there was but one mail a week, brought here in a one-horse 
wagon. If a person wished to go to New York he must cross 
■over to Quogue, take the mail stage which came from Sag 
Harbor, and he would reach the city at the close of the second 
day. A newspaper clipping tells us that "on the 25th day of 
July, 1844, the first train passed over the Long Island Rail- 
road from Brooklyn to Greenport, and the event was duly cele- 
brated." Well it might be. It was the commencement of a 
new order of things. Since then Riverhead has been a part 
of the world. 

At the Upper Mills there had been at various times a grist 
mill, a saw-mill, and a fulling mill, all owned by Richard Al- 
bertson, and his son after him, and built in the latter part of 
the last century. In 1828 John Perkins became the proprie- 
tor of the water-power and established a business the^e that 
has been for long years one of the most important industries. 
With that honesty and enterprise that have ever distinguished 
them, the name becam.e a household word in all parts of Suffolk 
County. " If you buy Perkins' cloth," said an old farmer, 
" you know what you have got, but if you buy this store cloth 
it will like enough drop off of you in the street." No such 
catastrophe ever occurred with cloth that was made at the 
Upper Mills. 

Sixty years ago there were about thirty houses in all scat- 
tered along the main road, and outside of the main street there 
was not a dwelling of any description. Cutting wood and ship- 
ping it on small vessels was the most important industry and 
employed more men during the winter than any other enter- 
prise. As the level of the street was much lower then, it was 
no uncommon thing for the tide to come up to the old Court 

27 



House; and there are now living in this village two ladies who^ 
when young, picked huckleberries in a swamp where Bridge 
Street now is — Mrs. Daniel R. Edwards and Mrs. Noah W. 
Hallock. Some seventy years ago the house of the late David 
Jagger was moved from the " Middle Road." To accomplish 
this it was necessary to move it east to the fork of the roads 
and then west to Riverhead. It was quite an event and re- 
quired a great many yoke of oxen. 

It can be readily understood that the population here was far 
too small to constitute a church or to justify the erection of a 
meeting-house. As late as 1828 the people from Flanders, 
Riverhead, Baiting Hollow, Northville and east as far as Mat- 
tituck, went to the Steeple Church at Upper Aquebogue to 
worship. But a volume could be written to tell the lives and 
labors of a class of reverent preachers who, with small reward 
for constant labor, made it the object of their lives to do good. 
Their meetings were held in barns, schoolhouses, private resi- 
dences, and even in the open air, and their coming was 
anxiously awaited. The Steeple Church might be called the 
mother of churches. It was a portion of this congregation 
that in*i829 built a small meeting-house about two miles east 
of this village. In 1834 this congregation was also divided, 
one portion taking the meeting-house, removing it to North- 
ville. The remainder established a church in Riverhead, and 
at first worshipped in the lower room of the Seminary build- 
ing, till the erection of the Congregational Church in 1841. 
But prior to this came the Methodist Church, with its untiring 
ministry. This society was organized in 1833, and the first 
meeting-house built in 1834, to be succeeded in 1870 by the 
the present elegant edifice. The followers of Emanuel Swed- 
enborg organized a society in 1839 ^^^^ built a house of wor- 
ship in 1855. The old Court House, or County Hall, as it 
was generally called, might, in the early days, have well been 
called a church of all denominations. The Congregational 
Church of Upper Aquebogue always claimed this neighbor- 
hood as a part of their parish, and every other Sunday Mr. 

28 



Sweezy, the pastor, would preach in the building. Next came 
the Methodist circuit rider, who would preach on Friday after- 
noon or evening, making his temporary home (for he had no 
abiding one) at the house of Dr. Osborn ; and at a later day, 
the service of the Roman Catholic Church would be conducted 
in the same place, their church being built in 1870. The 
Free Methodists built their church in 1872. The Episcopal- 
ians commenced stated worship in 1870, and erected a chapel 
in 1873. So far all these varied denominations have lived in 
harmony, which we trust will never be interrupted. 

For long years the schools were of the most inferior de- 
scription ; the only ones that had the slightest claim to being 
educational institutions being schools kept at Upper and Lower 
Aquebogue, the former by Josiah Reeve, who was afterward 
Sheriff of the county, and the latter by Judge David Warner. 
These had a well-deserved reputation, and their influence for 
good was felt far and wide. 

Riverhead, and indeed Suffolk County, is indebted to the 
late Judge George Miller for much that is good, but in nothing 
is it under greater obligation that for the seminary established 
by him in 1834 to advance the cause of female education. It 
was from the commencement a complete success, and its in- 
fluence for good can be hardly expressed in words. It is 
fortunate for the present generation that the days of the old- 
fashioned district school have passed away, and it is to be 
hoped that the entire community fully appreciates the advan- 
tages of the Union School and the tireless labors of our well- 
trained and efificient teachers. 

We must not fail to give our due meed of praise to the 
followers of the "art preservative of arts." Our first news- 
paper, the Suffolk Gazette, was started in August, 1849, under 
the editorial management of John Hancock. The next year 
it was removed to Sag Harbor, but came back to its native 
place in 1854, and ended its career shortly after. Then came 
the Suffolk Union, with Washington Van Zandt as editor, in 
1859, ^ very fearless paper during the early days of the Civil 

29 



War. The office, which stood on the south side of Main 
Street, just west of the residence of the late Dr. Luce, was 
burned about thirty years ago and pubHcation stopped. A 
few years afterward, Buel G. Davis, an energetic young man 
from Greenport, started the Monitor here, but it did not con- 
tinue long, being purchased by James S. Evans, who merged 
it in a paper he was publishing in Setauket, which establish- 
ment was afterwards removed to Patchogue and survives 
to-day in the Patchogue Advance. Then James B. Slade, 
started in a very modest way what he called an advertising 
sheet, which grew into the RivcrJiead Neivs. In 1875, Wm. 
R. Duvall purchased the Nezvs and continued it till the time 
of his death in 1882. Mr. Duvall was a witty, sarcastic and 
effective writer, and humorous as well, though, strange to say, 
he seldom smiled. He had traveled a great deal and had a 
wide knowledge of the world and men. His son and name- 
sake succeeded to his work and well maintains the character 
and influence of the paper. 

We cannot do better than to present a picture of River- 
head as it was fifty years ago, as taken from notes kindly 
furnished by Hon. Henry P. Hedges, who has been so long 
identified with the public life of Suffolk County, and who 
came here fresh from college to study law with Judge Miller. 
He says: 

"I went to Riverhead in October, 1840, when the 
Harrison campaign 'log cabin and hard cider' cries were heard. 
At that time Henry T. Penney and John Corwin kept the 
hotels. Penney was Deputy Sheriff and kept a hotel in an 
old-fashioned house formerly of his father-in-law, William 
Griffing, the father of Wells and Hubbard Griffing. At that 
time there were about forty houses in Riverhead. Dr. 
Osborn's was almost the extreme west, only one or two 
houses beyond it. The avenue to the railroad station was 
then a cart path, and where the Court House now stands was 
thick woods. My solitary walk was often over that cart path, 
north to where is now the cemetery. At that time the 

30 



Griffings were shipping wood to Providence; Judge Miller 
was in the thick of his professional fight ; Sidney L. Grififin 
was the only other lawyer in Riverhead ; Dr. Thomas Osborn 
was in active practice as a physician and so was Dr. Doane ; 
Capt. Edward Vail was running a vessel, also Capt. Harry 
Horton and James Horton ; William Jagger and David Jagger 
were advocating temperance; their father, David, was then 
living; Herman D. Foster, Elijah Terry and Nathan Corwin 
were selling goods in country stores; David Davis was build- 
ing vessels; Timothy Aldrich was building the church; Rev. 
C. J. Knowles was minister ; Clem. Hempstead was painting 
houses and wagons ; Mulford Moore was blacksmithing; Geo. 
Halsey was tailoring; Titus Conklin was making shoes; and 
Aunt Polly Griffing was doing then, as always, the work of 
the good Samaritan ; Daniel Edwards, was keeping the jail ; 
John Perkins was manufacturing cloth at the Upper Mills; 
Isaac Sweezy, across the river, was grinding grain, and John. 
P. Terry, now of the Long Island House, was living with him 
and threshing rye with a flail. 

"The County Courts were held three times a year. Hugh 
Halsey was first Judge. Henry Landon, Judge Gillett and 
Richard M. Conkling were among the Associate Judges, and 
Selah B. Strong was District Attorney. The principal lawyers 
who came to court were S. S. Gardiner of Shelter Island and 
Samuel L. Gardiner of Sag Harbor, and Abraham T. Rose. 
These were the only ones from the east. From the west were 
Selah B. Strong, Judge Buffett, Charles A. Floyd, and a little 
later John G. Floyd. The old Court House and jail is now 
occupied by the Perkins Bros, as a clothing store. Charles 
Vail and his brother Gamaliel were old residents in the same 
house, where they continued for many years; now the house 
of D. F. Vail. North of the Main Street there were no 
houses, nor on any street parallel with the Main Street. The 
religious meetings were held in what was called the lecture 
room, where the Congregational Church now stands. The 
Ladies' Seminary was taught by Mrs. Miller, and was located 

31 



on the same lot. In 1841, the 3d of April, I find a memo- 
randum : 'Day before yesterday raised meeting-house in River- 
head.' On December i, same year, it was dedicated. Mr. 
Badger, Secretary of the Home Missionary Society, spoke 
from the text, "It is none other than the house of God.' 
Hubbard and Wells Griffing were among the most munificent 
contributors to that church. There came from Flanders to 
trade the peculiar characteristic people from that section — the 
old preacher, Nathaniel Fanning, who built his own church, 
old Major David Brown and 'Uncle Joe' Goodale. These 
two were rivals for the control of Flanders. At that time 
David Edwards was Justice, a very competent man and so 
mild-mannered that he never offended anyone. In some cases 
there would be testimony absolutely conflicting, and plain per- 
jury on one and sometimes on both sides. He would allude 
to this in his charge as 'a little discrepancy between the evi- 
dence for plaintiff and defendant.' He was a great admirer of 
the works of Pope, especially the 'Essay on Man.' One of 
the men of stronger intellect, and who impressed his opin- 
ions very largely upon his companions, was Elijah Terry. 
Johnson was the first man that I saw hung in the county. He 
did not look like a malicious man. I think Judge Rose de- 
fended him. I remember Judge D. G. Gillett of Patchogue, 
who came to Riverhead and attended conventions. He was a 
large, thick-set man and of very impressive appearance ; 
and also Dr. Fred. W. Lord, a man of powerful intellect and 
pre-eminent as a public speaker. In 1840 Judge Abraham T. 
Rose was the most accomplished speaker, politically and as an 
advocate before a jury, in this county. It was said that Chan- 
cellor Kent once came down to Riverhead to hold a court of 
Oyer and Terminer, but found no lawyer, no cases, no prisoner, 
and adjourned for want of business. Titus Conklin was very 
intelligent, benevolent, and an active man in the church and 
business, and he had as fellow workers Deacon Hubbard Grif- 
fing, Wells Grififing, Isaac Sweezy, Herman D. Foster and 
first of all, Judge George Miller, who for a long time held 

32 



meetings in the Court House and conducted the services. He 
was the founder and upholder of the Congregational Church ; 
the Methodist Church was upheld by John Perkins and his 
family, and Dr. Osborn, who were its main supporters. Jona- 
than Horton preached in the Swederborgian Church, and was 
the heart of that organization. Sells Edwards employed him 
to draw his will. It was intended to give a life estate to a 
prodigal son, but by a mistake he gave him the whole fee of 
his portion. Judge Miller used to say Sells Edwards saved 50 
•cents in writing a will and lost $10,000. Sylvester Miller 
was a man of excellent understanding. He was Justice of the 
Peace and Supervisor for many years. He was prudent, with 
a strong sense of justice, and was fully competent to control 
and direct. Judge John Woodhull was a man rather intelli- 
gent, cautious and discreet, not disposed to yield to the popu- 
lar current, and more disposed to row against than with it. 
He was thoroughly honest and very careful and deliberate. 
He had the confidence of all. In personal appearance he 
was tall, spare, bent, lean, angular, blue-eyed, and wore blue 
spectacles, owing to weak eyes. He was a strong Federalist. 
He lived to be 100 years old. David Warner was a very 
large and tall man. He was a man of strong understanding, 
and he well knew it, and was somewhat above his contem- 
poraries in reading, intelligence, in thought and in position. In 
later life his mind became unbalanced. He died nearly ninety 
years of age." 

At what time settlements were first made in the eastern 
part of the town is unknown, but it is probable that they are 
at least as old as the settlement of Wading River. At the 
location called in early days the "Fresh Ponds" and now 
" Baiting Hollow," a settlement is believed to have been, as 
early as 1719, and in 1792 a church was organized with a few 
members. Previous to that the people had doubtless been 
connected with the church at Wading River, said to have been 
old in 1750. We may add here that the churches which were 
known as the " Strict Congregational," had their origin in the 

33 



famous " New Light" movement that originated in New Eng- 
land about 1744; their leader on Long Island was Rev. Elisha 
Payne, who was pastor of the " New Light " church at Bridge 
Hampton, and whose tombstone may be seen in the Hay 
Ground cemetery near that village. In 1803 a small meeting 
house was built at Baiting Hollow, which was succeeded by the 
present edifice, built in 1862. Time fails us to give due justice 
to the memory of Rev, Manly Wells, Nathan Dickinson,. 
David Benjamin, Azel Downs, and their successors, whose 
names are identified with the history of this church. The vil- 
lage and country round has been the home of thrifty citizens, 
whose family names are among the oldest in our town. It was 
here that the first Swedenborgian church was organized, whose 
leader and teacher for many years was Jonathan Horton, its 
chief supporter. An important item in the history of North- 
ville is the memorable repulse of a party sent from a British 
squadron to capture several sloops lying near the shore, on May 
31, 1 8 14. The American militia (a small company of thirty) 
was under the command of Capt. John Wells, a man of resolute 
will and great courage, a member of the Legislature in after 
years, and who has left many prominent descendants, among 
them the late Alden Wells, a son. The attack was met with 
so vigorous a defense that the enemy soon withdrew, their 
errand unaccomplished. 

Doubtless the most ancient settlement in the town is the 
region known as Upper and Lower Aquebogue ; the latter 
portion being now generally known as Jamesport. From the 
fact that this latter region was frequently spoken of as "Old 
Aquebogue," we may conclude that it may claim priority of 
settlement, and with the more reason as it was nearer to the 
parent village of Southold. When these settlements were 
actually begun, we have at present no knowledge, but it is 
hoped that a more thorough investigation will eventually 
throw light upon the subject. From our present information, 
we conclude that it was about 1 690. It is believed that a church 
was established here in the early part of the last century, and 

34 



a meeting-house built on the cemetery lot, where the first 
interment is said to have been made in 1775- This church 
was doubtless an offshoot or a branch of the old church at 
Southold, but on the 26th of March, 1758, a "New Light" 
Church, or as it was called, "The First Strict Congregational 
Church of Southold," was organized by Rev. Elisha Payne. 
From the fact that they occupied the old meeting-house, we 
<;onclude that it absorbed the former organization, or at least 
a majority. We may say here that the "New Light" bore 
the same relation to the old Congregational Churches that 
the Puritans did to the Church of England ; their motto was 
"Come forth from the world and be ye perfect," At intervals 
of a few years large numbers were added to the church by 
revivals of religion, and among them was Manly Wells, Daniel 
Youngs and David Benjamin, who, as preachers, were after- 
ward known throughout the country. In 1797 the old church 
at Upper Aquebogue was replaced by a new and larger one, 
rebuilt- in 1833, and a tall steeple, which from the peculiar 
nature of the country was visible for a great distance round, 
and gave to the building and also to the neighborhood, the 
name of "Steeple Church;" and this, in 1863 was replaced by 
a still larger building. The old one was removed to River- 
head, by the late George N. Howell, and converted into two 
stores, now owned by John Robert Corwin, and occupied by 
Davis & Son and Lee & Bunce. The names of Timothy 
Wells, Daniel Youngs, Moses Sweezy and Parshall Terry 
must ever be identified w^ith its history. In 1829, about 
sixty members of this church withdrew and built a new one 
about half way to Riverhead, and a few years later this again 
was divided, part with the church building removing to North- 
ville, the remainder to Riverhead. 

The great success of Sag Harbor, as a port for whaling 
ships, prompted a few men, among whom the foremost were 
James Tuthill, of Southold, and James Halsey, of Bridge 
Hampton, to purchase Miamogue Neck, and establish a new 
seaport, which from the names of its principal founders was 

35 



called Jamesport. Its rapid growth at first is mentioned by 
the historian Prime, who in 1845 says: "In 1833 there was 
not a single habitation here, now some forty." The place was 
well started by building a hotel and a good wharf, and at one 
time two or three whale ships sailed from here, but the failure 
of the whale fishery ended its prosperity. In 1849, James 
Halsey, one of the founders, started for California overland, 
but never reached the land of gold. The future of Jamesport 
is doubtless to be a summer resort, for which it is well adapted. 
In Lower Aquebogue, the oldest church in this town was estab- 
lished, it is believed as early as 1728. It was Presbyterian, 
and a church building was erected in 1731, and a hundred 
years later was repaired and enlarged. It was eventually 
merged into the Lower Aquebogue Congregational Church. 
We cannot fail to mention the Camp Meeting Association 
which annually in August attracts crowds of worshipers from 
all the country round. Jamesport will long be distinguished 
as the home of two brothers, Messrs. Simeon S, and Edward 
Hawkins, both of whom have represented the First Senatorial 
District at Albany, and who, belonging to different political 
parties, are notable illustrations of a fact which politicians 
sometimes forget, that men can be good representatives and 
not belong to your party. 

A fact but little known and proper to be stated here, is 
that in 1793 Mrs. Phebe Wickham, at her house, near Matti- 
tuck, established the first Sunday-school in Suffolk County, 
only eleven years after Robert Raikes, the father of Sunday- 
schools, began them in London, Mrs. Wickham was a half 
sister of the famous traveler, John Ledyard. She died in Gro- 
ton in 1840. 

There are many persons besides those we have mentioned of 
whom extended notice should be given, like the Hon. John S. 
Marcy, a genial and generous man ; Rev. Thomas Cook, pub- 
lic-spirited and of great energy ; Nathan Corwin, long a leader 
in town matters and who in his person always seemed to us as 
the incarnation of Riverhead Town ; his long-time partner, 

36 



John C. Davis, Member of Assembly thirty years ago; Silas S. 
Terry, a man greatly beloved by a wide circle of acquaintances ; 
his partner, Joshua L. Wells, in early life a successful school 
teacher; Dr. R. H. Benjamin, a zealous supporter of his 
church and the public school, and who, as first president of the 
Savings Bank, laid broad and deep the foundations of its great 
success; his successor. Dr. A. B. Luce; John Corwin, the 
popular landlord; and scores of others, useful, prominent citi- 
zens of this town, who have gone to their reward ; but the 
limit of time and space forbids ; nor can we attempt to add the 
names of those who, natives here, have achieved honorable 
name elsewhere. There is one name, however, that must be 
mentioned. Tappin Reeve, son of Rev. Abner Reeve, a 
clergyman of this town, became famous as a lawyer and founder 
of the celebrated law school at Litchfield, Conn. He was the 
first eminent lawyer in this country to arraign the common law 
of England for its cruelty in cutting off the natural rights of 
married women and placing their property entirely within the 
control of their husbands. This year is the lOOth anniversary 
of the passage of the first Act in our Legislature looking to- 
the liberation of married women from this bondage, and by 
a law passed at our last Legislature the reform which Mr„ 
Reeve first preached is thoroughly effected. He died in 
1823, but he lived long enough to see his principles gain a 
footing in Connecticut, though at first they did not meet with 
much favor. 

A book should be written to preserve the memory of 
what Riverhead Town did to aid in the war to preserve 
the Union. She promptly voted down all disloyal reso- 
lutions offered by the few sympathizers that rebellion had 
here, and supplied all the moneys necessary to do her part^ 
while one hundred and twenty-two of her citizens went 
to the front, of whom ten never returned. Of those who 
did return, sixteen have answered to the last roll call here, 
and time is reducing the ranks of the remaining. 



37 



Then honor to the brave who nobly died; 
And honor to the men who by their side 

Survived the canon's hail 

With hearts that did not quail 
When all our country's fate was cast 
For life or death in War's fierce blast. 

— Dr. Whitaker. 

The time and space we have devoted to the past forbids 
our entering upon extended remarks as to the future. We 
have endeavored to give a picture of the times that are 
gone; but the things that are, surround us now, and they 
speak for themselves. The unpainted and unsteepled meet- 
ing-house is succeeded by the elegant church edifice. The 
little rustic schoolhouse of the rudest kind, and for whose 
maintenance every dollar was grudged, is supplanted by the 
Union School, for which no expense is too great and no orna- 
ment too good. Compare the private dwelling of to-day with 
the homes of our best citizens of generations past, and how 
great the contrast. To-day a good selection of books and the 
weekly or daily newspapers are found in every household ; 
then the Bible and the almanac comprised almost their only 
library, and of newspapers their were none. In matters of 
decoration, how great the change. There is not a house that 
has not a multitude of things which the good people of the 
past would have called the "superfluities of life." The 
chromos and engravings that now adorn the humblest homes 
would have been miracles of art a century ago. The increase 
of means of communication with the outside world are too 
apparent to require mention. Where the thrifty village was 
in the early times we find it more thrifty still; and where once 
was an unbroken forest we see around us all the evidences of 
prosperity and happiness. 

If towns and villages have their periods of decline it is 
nothing strange, for cities and nations have the same ; but the 
general progress is still onward. The traveler who ascends a 
lofty mountain will not find his journey one regular ascent 
from the base to the summit. For a long distance he will be 

38 



traveling over apparently level ground ; then he will ascend a 
slight elevation, then he will descend into a valley, and for a 
part of his journey he will actually be going down hill; but as 
he travels on he will find that the valley of the present mo- 
ment is higher than the hill on which he stood an hour before. 
At one time he will be as completely hidden from the goal of 
his hopes as if he were in the center of the earth, and again 
he will be in full view of the object of his aspirations. 

And so he goes on and on, through all changes of climate 
and varieties of vegetation, till he reaches that chill region of 
mist and cloud, where no life exists and which marks the 
border line of perpetual snow. But beyond all these, the 
cloud and darkness left behind, he enters a region of perpetual 
hght and his feet at length tread the summit where the sun 
shines forever with unclouded glory. 



The band here played again, and then Chairman Foster 
presented Prof. Joseph M. Belford of Riverhead, who de- 
livered the following address : 

What man has done, how he has done it, and what results 
have followed his action, are questions that not only power- 
fully appeal to' the imagination, but engage the intellect as 
well. There is probably no field of investigation into which 
the human mind can enter that in a greater degree stimulates 
the curiosity, and arouses and sustains the interest, than that 
of human history. With unwearied patience, in the face of 
■difificulties that seemed insurmountable, we find man feeling 
his way through the past, reading its cuneiform inscriptions, 
deciphering its Babylonian bricks, exploring its pyramids, 
studying its art, its architecture, its literature, anything 
and everything that might throw any light upon the life of 
a people that had played its part in the solemn drama of 
history. 

And there is no field of study that is more fruitful of 
solemn lessons than this, for as man comes to study the facts 

39 



of the past, not as isolated phenomena, but in their obvious 
and necessary relation to each other, as so many successive 
links in the great chain of historic evolution, he is over- 
whelmed with the fact that here as everywhere in the universe 
he is within the domain of law; that there is just as absolute 
and fixed an order of sequence in the phenomena of his- 
tory as there is in the phenomena of nature; that the scientific 
observer can with no more certainty lay down the law of 
sequence in the facts he observes in nature, than the historical 
observer can lay down the law of sequence in the facts he ob- 
serves in history; that things no more happen fortuitously in 
the growth of a nation than they happen fortuitously in the 
growth of a plant ; that nations have a law of life and decay, 
just as trees have a law of life and decay; that a nation can no 
more grow in contravention of law than an oak can. 

And whether we study the civilization of Greeks or Aztecs, 
of Persians or Indians, of English or French, we find the law 
of their development always the same. The reason why one 
nation attains a higher point of civilization than another is not 
that it had a different law of development, but that the same 
law had a freer scope and a wider range. And along broad 
lines these laws are very distinct. Every one, for example, 
recognizes that there is a necessaiy relation between the char- 
acter of a people and their external surroundings. The student 
of history isn't surprised to find the Greek mind and tempera- 
ment one thing, and the Asiatic mind and temperament quite 
another thing. The conditions of their life make this impera- 
tive. It isn't a matter of accident, it's the outworking of a 
fixed law. Every one of us is familiar with the laiv of supply 
and demand ; the law of ratio between the wages of labor and 
the cost of food. These are things that we can't escape. They 
inhere in the very constitution of society. Have you ever re- 
flected that there is a fixed ratio between the number of mar- 
riages that occur in any given year and the price of corn in 
that year — the higher the price of corn the fewer marriages, the 
lower the price of corn the more numerous the marriages? Sa 

40 



that if the young men of Riverhead Town seriously wish to 
multiply their chances in this direction, let them set about 
lowering the price of corn. 

But, seriously, when once this idea of law has possessed 
us, when we can see everywhere the silent, resistless play of 
unseen forces, working their way on and through and over 
all obstructions, to the final destiny which God has marked 
out for nature and man, " that one far-off divine event to 
which the whole creation moves," not only will we come to 
study the facts with a deepening interest, but with a deepening 
reverence as well, and we will come to see that history is 
something more than a mere catalogue of events, something 
more than a record of sieges and battles and crusades. We 
will see in it all and through it all the Divine purpose with re- 
gard to man, ever unfolding, ever ripening, through shadow 
and through sunshine, through the inky darkness of mediaeval 
ignorance and the meridian splendor of Nineteenth Century 
knowledge, ever approaching the splendid fulfillment of which 
the law of development — -which is stamped upon all that God 
has made — gives us certain assurance. 

It is this conception of history that brings order out of 
chaos. The scientific student assures us that in the whole 
realm of natural phenomena there is no such thing as catas- 
trophe ; that what we are accustomed to look upon as sudden 
upheavals or violent cataclysms in nature, are it] reality only 
the necessary and orderly giving way of old to new conditions 
under the direction of law. So, too, the historical student, 
from this higher standpoint of observation, assures us that there 
are no catastrophes in history ; that amid all those social and 
political upheavals which threaten to disrupt society, through- 
out all the conventions or congresses or parliaments with their 
fury of debate, amid all the battle fields with their clangor 
of arms and their groans of the dying, always, always there 
has been an imperative law higher than all these things and 
regulating them all and evolving from them new and higher 
social conditions and possibilities. 

41 



Now, so much for the way in which we ought to study 
Tiistory. And if we are to hope for any higher or larger de- 
velopment in the future it must come from just such thought- 
ful study of the past, of the causes which contribute to its 
growth, of the law underlying its development. For law, my 
friends, can never change; it's the same for all times, all sea- 
sons, all conditions ; the same for the falling apple and the 
blazing meteor; the same for the dew-drop and the ocean ; the 
same for the dust molecule that noiselessly settles on your 
parlor mirror and the cruel avalanche thundering down the 
sides of the mountains ; law everywhere and always the same. 
Conditions change, phenomena change, environment changes, 
but law never. So that under whatever law of life and de- 
velopment your ancestors lived one hundred years ago you live 
to-day, and you can hope for no change or advantage in this 
regard. It's true, the conditions of your life are widely differ- 
ent; it's true that your environment has been much enlarged, 
but be convinced of one thing, that if there was any law of rela- 
tion between the means at your ancestors' command and the 
use they made of those means you live under the same law, and 
you can neither escape nor modify its operation. 

Now, however complex an organization society may seem 
to be, yet the great principles underlying social growth are 
simple and obvious, and easy of statement. In the first place, 
man can never separate himself from nature, and it must be 
apparent, as I have already hinted, that very largely social 
development must depend on the character of our relation 
with the external world. Think what a wondrous storehouse 
this nature is. It stands for something more than a moving 
panorama of light and beauty, delighting the eye and feasting 
the imagination ; something more than a treasury of wealth in 
precious metals and precious stones. It stands for us too as 
a wondrous depository of forces, . ever present and always 
potent, from whose play we can never escape, and from a 
proper utilization of which it is probable there arises more sub- 
stantial and permanent social development than from any 

42 



other cause. I think it is not an extravagant statement to 
say that civilization is advanced or retarded, suffering di- 
minishes or increases, according as man dominates or is domin- 
ated by these forces. We see him go into nature's forest, 
hew down her trees, transform them into dwelhngs, multiply 
these into villages, into cities, utilize her forces to do his 
work, to light and heat his houses, to propel his machinery, 
to elevate his grain, to carry his burdens, turning her to a 
thousand noble uses, and we cry, Behold the wondrous impetus 
given to the social movement ! See how man is lord and master 
of nature! But look again. From out the summit of Vesu- 
vius a little cloud of smoke begins to rise. The scientists 
watch it with interest as an evidence that other of the internal 
forces of nature are at work; the smoke becomes flame, the 
flame becomes lava and ashes; down the mountain sides it 
streams, burying houses, burying people; Herculaneum and 
Pompeii nothing more than a mighty sepulcher, entombed for 
hundreds of centuries. Look again. This nature denies the 
fruit of the earth for a season — famine comes, plague comes, 
and we hear the cry of anguish from starving millions in 
Russia or India. No, No! Any philosophy of social de- 
velopment that would ignore this relation of man to the 
world in which he lives would be singularly inadequate and 
incomplete. Out of this relationship spring the most mag- 
nificent discoveries of science; and along the line of scientific 
discovery lie some of the grandest possibilities of civilization. 
You don't light your houses with pine knots and tallow dips 
any more. Why? Because the student of nature has been 
abroad and has caught the lightning from the clouds and has 
given you it as a means of light. You no longer spend weary 
days jolting and bumping and exasperating yourself and your 
neighbor passenger in going from point to point over roads 
almost impassable. Why? Because scientific discovery has 
found in nature another mode of motion. Look where you 
will you find the fruits of this spirit of discovery. And as 
Henry Thomas Buckle says, "The discoveries of great men 

43 



never leave us. They are immortal. They contain those 
eternal truths which survive the shock of empires, outlive the 
struggles of rival creeds and witness the decay of successive 
faiths. All these have their different measures and different 
standards, one set of opinions for one age, another set for 
another. They pass away like a dream ; they are as the fabric 
of a vision which leave not a rack behind. The discoveries 
of genius alone remain. They are for all ages and all times; 
never young and never old, they bear the seeds of their own 
Mfe. They flow on in a perennial and undying stream ; they 
are essentially cumulative and giving birth to the additions 
which they subsequently receive, they thus influence the most 
distant posterity, and after the lapse of centuries produce 
more effect than they were able to do even at the moment of 
their promulgation." 

Your ancestors of a hundred years ago hardly felt the im- 
press of this current of discovery. But we feel it now, we are 
a part of it. For it is of the essence of scientific discovery 
that you can't limit its application as to time or place. We 
may say that a great deal that is going on in the scientific 
world is of no immediate interest or concern to us; that it can 
neither directly or indirectly advance or retard our develop- 
ment. But we're wrong if we say that. A new scientific 
truth is the possession of the world. It enlarges by so much 
our knowledge of the world in which we live, and our com- 
mand of the forces by which we are surrounded. Says the 
same learned writer whom I have already quoted: "In a great 
and comprehensive view the changes in every civilized people 
are in their aggregate dependent on three things: First, on the 
amount of knowledge possessed by their ablest men; second, 
on the direction which that knowledge takes, that is to say,. 
the sort of subject to which it refers; thirdly, and above all ■ 
(mark that), above all on the extent to which the knowledge 
is diffused and the freedom with which it pervades all classes 
of society." And in our day, with a telegraph system girdling 
the earth, no sooner is a fresh scientific discovery made than it 

44 



becomes the possession of every race and every clime. In our 
age there is no such thing as a monopoly of knowledge. You 
may effect a corner in wheat, but you can't effect a corner in 
brain product. That immediately becomes the property of 
inquiring millions, going by so much to enrich their intel- 
lectual possessions, and so contribute to their social develop- 
ment. Now in the next hundred years we are to live right in 
the flood-tide of this tremendous impulse that has been given 
to scientific study and discovery. And if you will compare, 
and I need not make this comparison for you, the multiplied 
blessings which have followed these discoveries, the beneficent 
uses to which they have been turned — if you will compare these 
things with what you recollect or what you read of the condi- 
tions of life that confronted your ancestors, you may find some 
just basis of speculation or prophecy as to what the next 
hundred years may develop. 

But it isn't alone in the way of outward material advantages 
that the spirit of scientific discovery enriches us. It does some- 
thing more for us than to give us devices for lighting and heat- 
ing our homes or giving us labor-saving machines. It brings 
within the reach of every one a literary product of which our 
ancestors never dreamed. I know that a great many bad 
books are written. I know that very much that passes under 
the name of poetry and romance is fit for nothing but for bon- 
fires, and that it would make uncommonly poor material for 
that. I know that many of the utterances of the so-called 
realistic school reek with moral filth and every form of literary 
abomination. But I know, too, that all over the world there 
are intellects all afiame with the fire of genius and hearts all 
aglow with love to God and man, that are pouring out a stream 
of mental health and moral strength and spiritual beauty that 
must enrich the age in which they live and form a precious 
heritage for the future; writers whose sentiment is so pure 
and whose moral tone is so lofty that it finds its way as a 
mighty potential force into the hearts and lives of those who 
are aiming to make the age in which they live a better age, 

45 



whose aspiration is to help on the social movement along the 
line of loftier, purer character and an enlarged manhood and 
womanhood. Don't let me be misunderstood. I have no 
purpose to disparage the libraries of one hundred years ago. I 
fear we are a little too much given to patronizing our fore- 
fathers. We are apt to institute unfavorable comparisons 
between their rather limited opportunities and the almost 
boundless resources of the modern student. We are apt to 
think that they didn't have many books, and that we ought not 
to expect them to know very much. Well, I presume they 
didn't have very many books ; but then I'm not sure that the 
value of a library is measured by the number of volumes on 
the shelves. There is another and a higher test than that. 
A book is valuable not so much for the knowledge it gives as 
for the character it develops. And from this higher stand- 
point possibly their libraries were not so meagre after all. If 
they had not many books they had good ones. Now and then 
you found Burns there — sweet, gentle Robert Burns, who has 
found a voice for every human sorrow, a cry to the pitying 
Father for every human need ; whose sympathy was aroused 
alike by the daisy carelessly upturned by his plow and by the 
sorrows of struggling men and women, toiling on in obscurity 
under a burden of poverty. And ihey had their Shakespeare, 
to whose affluent genius all knowledge and all experience 
seemed an open secret ; who read the human heart and un- 
folded its workings as astronomers read the stars and tell us 
their elements. And, above all and grander than all, they had 
their Bible, not as a text-book for critical study, but as a veri- 
table fountain of life, drawing from it sustenance and strength, 
and the amplest equipment for their daily duties. To them 
the songs of David meant more than the rhythm or cadence 
of Hebrew poetry; they meant actual power to uplift and sus- 
tain. To them they turned when the burden grew too heavy or 
the sorrow pressed too sorely, and they found in them — not 
words, but the Lord God himself, a tower of strength in the hour 
of need. And before the type of manhood and womanhood that 

46 



they evolved from these elements you and I must stand to-day 
with uncovered heads in reverent homage. It was a manhood 
and womanhood that would have graced any time and any civil- 
ization. Heroic in self-sacrifice, large in charity, lofty in ideal, 
affluent in all the graces that adorn and dignify the human 
character, it ought to move you with pride to look back upon 
such an ancestry. In contemplation of this larger worth we 
lose sight of oddities of manner or extravagances of dress. 
These are accidental, adventitious, the creature of the hour, 
the whim of the moment, liable to constant change and fluc- 
tuation, but character is an undying possession, and for it we 
can have nothing but the deepest reverence. We may smile 
at the bonnet as capacious as a Saratoga trunk, or at the bodice 
as stiff and as unyielding as the laws of the Medes and Persians, 
but we don't smile at the large hearts and the generous souls 
which gave to Riverhead Town such a history as it has had for 
a hundred years. 

Yet granting all this, and not losing sight for a moment of 
our obligation to the past, what of the future? I find it im- 
possible to cherish the belief that the past is exhaustive of 
high possibilities of life and character. You may say that it 
is of the essence of lofty character that it be developed by 
hardships ; that it is born in travail, nourished and perfected in 
suffering, and that an amelioration of the conditions of life 
naturally tends to an emasculation of the moral fibre, a general 
lowering of the moral tone. But in so saying don't you 
neglect another obvious arrangement in the moral economy of 
the universe, namely, that these very changes create new 
hardships, and that, however great may be the change in the 
condition of life, there can never be any change in the law of 
character? Be sure of this: God never leaves any age without 
the proper and necessary conditions of development. Nay, 
more ; all history proves that He provides for an ever loftier 
standard of character, and places man in the Very conditions 
which make the attainment of that standard possible. A great 
deal of the apprehension that is expressed for the present and 

47 



for the future has its foundation in a false philosophy, and a 
neglect of the most obvious teachings of history. We need 
not fear man nor his work. Whatever obligation the future 
may lay upon him he will manfully meet. And this brings me 
to the principal purpose of my address to-day. If we look 
backward we see the noble line of patient men and women, 
working out, in the face of discouragement and difficulty, the 
history which is theirs and ours to-day. Their work is com- 
pleted, at least so far as their active participation in it is con- 
cerned. But in the sense of there being in every good and 
generous deed, and in every noble life, a power of reproduc- 
tion and perpetuation, that work can never die. It must form 
an integral part of the future history of the town by whomso- 
ever that history shall be made. Looking forward, our eyes 
rest upon the youth to whom is committed the future destiny 
of Riverhead Town. All it is ever to become they must make^ 
it. It is an obligation that can neither be eluded nor shifted. 
It is an obligation that is individual and personal, it is yours 
and mine, and it cannot be relegated or assigned to other 
hands. I have hinted at the aids we are to have from the out- 
side, in the fact that we move right along in this wonderful 
current of scientific discovery, of the invention of machinery, 
of the literary products of an age that is singularly prolific of 
good literary work. All these things will be ours and all will 
contribute to our growth. But the future history of River- 
head Town depends not nearly so much on what you receive 
from the outside, as on what you evolve from the inside ; not 
so much on what the world gives you, as on what you give 
the world ; not so much from the contributions you receive 
from the busy brain workers in the world, as on the character 
of the work which you produce. Now, society has a perfectly 
legitimate expectation of you and me, and by so much as we 
defect that expectation, by so much do we subtract from the 
possible growth and development of the town or community 
in which we live. The first thing that society has a right to 
demand of us is that we should produce something, that we 

48 



should be producers and not consumers merely. That don't 
necessarily mean that we must produce a Paradise Lost, or an 
Atlantic Cable, or a Corliss engine, or a painting like the As- 
cension of Christ. These are among the products of genius 
that stand out solitary and eminent, with a yawning gulf 
between them and the ordinary product of the average 
mind. Society don't demand that we be Shakespeares, or 
Bacons, or Raphaels, or Edisons. It only demands, and it 
has a perfect right to demand, that we produce the very best 
of honest work of which we are capable in the sphere in which 
we live, and that we do that all the time. It is your work, 
your brain, your arm, highly consecrated and conscientiously 
directed to the noblest ends, that are going to give to River- 
head Town all of worth that it will develop in the next one 
hundred years. 

Don't make the mistake of setting up a false standard or 
criterion by which to measure your work. Above all, don't 
make the mistake of supposing that your sphere of action here 
in Riverhead Town is necessarily limited or proscribed. It is 
not always those who have reached distinction in what you feel 
are wider spheres and by shorter roads that have the most 
permanently enriched the age in which they lived. And right 
here and now it is your opportunity to do just as noble and 
just as lasting work as any the world has ever seen. Do you 
ask me how you can do this? Now, I can give you no settled 
or fixed rule by which you may achieve what the world calls 
success, or by means of which you may be secured against the 
possibility of what the world calls failure. I can formulate no 
principles for your guidance which will certainly bring to you 
fame or distinction. And possibly the very worst service I could 
render you would be to tabulate these rules, if any such there 
were. But I can tell you how your life may become a poten- 
tial force in the social history of Riverhead Town. It is by 
setting your ideal of life so high that character rather than rep- 
utation, duty rather than distinction, shall be the aim of your 
living. It is what we aim to do that exalts or belittles us. lie 



49 



who lives out a noble purpose, even in obscurity, so that he 
lives it out truly, is the benefactor of his race. I confess to 
you that to me there is no more moving spectacle than to see 
the noble youth of our town, with a consciousness of the obli- 
gation they owe to the age in which they live, girding them- 
selves for the life struggle before them. It partakes of the 
highest qualities of heroism. They are going to meet unseen 
dangers. They know that a thousand foes are lurking in the 
dark to tempt them from the high standard of life and charac- 
ter which they have set before them. But they are undaunted 
by all these things. The blood of Revolutionary sires courses 
in their veins. As they fought for freedom, so these will 
sternly strive to lay broad and deep the foundation of strong 
and enduring character. Like Emerson's hero, " they have 
not omitted the arming of the man. They have learned in 
season that they are born into the state of war, and that soci- 
ety and their own well-being require that they should not go 
dancing in the weeds of peace, but, warned, self-collected, 
and neither defying nor dreading the thunder, they take both 
reputation and life in their hands, and with perfect urbanity 
they dare the gibbet and the mob by the absolute truth of 
their speech, and the absolute rectitude of their behaviour." I 
am not painting an imaginary struggle. I am not dealing in 
rhetorical rhapsodies. I am outlining the conditions of the 
struggle that confronts every strong man and every earnest 
woman on the threshold of active life — conditions from which 
we can't escape, but from the right use of which the ripest 
fruits may be garnered and the proudest distinction gained. It 
is of the essence of all noble work that it carries with it its own 
compensation. " Work," says the seer of Concord, "in every 
hour, paid or unpaid ; see only that thou work, and thou 
canst not escape the reward ; whether thy work be fine or 
coarse, planting corn or writing epics, so only it be honest 
work, done to thine own approbation, it shall earn a reward to 
the senses as well as to the thought ; no matter how often 
defeated, you are born to victory. The reward of a thing well 

5° 



done, is to have done it." Can you measure the moral power 
of the young Hfe before me to-day, if it be so aroused and so 
directed? What method of calculation will you apply to the 
gross result of the interplay of such energies and forces in the 
social life of the next century? 

Young man and young woman you live in an age of mag- 
nificent opportunities. Those who lived and died a hundred 
years ago or more, have left you a precious heritage. I don't 
believe the sun shines upon a land where the rewards to honest 
toil are so swift and so sure as here. You are barred from no 
honorable calling by the accident of birth or the limitation of 
social caste. The only coat of arms that wins genuine homage 
here is the shield of personal honor and personal worth. 
And though you be born into a state of war, girded with that 
shield, the issue of the conflict is never doubtful. All that 
the broadest minds and the stoutest hearts have done, you 
may do. And the one grand lesson of this day and hour is 
that we live up to the measure of our opportunities. The 
Divine purpose with regard to man is moving on, and it will 
be wrought out with us if we stand in the van-guard, over us 
if we lag behind. The lessons of the past make the prophecy 
of the future sure. And we can help on the dawning of this 
brighter day. Will we do it^ 

" A sacred burden is the life ye bear; 
Look on it, lift it, bear it patiently, 
Stand up and walk beneath it steadfastly, 
Fail not for sorrow, falter not for sin, 
P)Ut onward, upward, till the goal ye win." 



The benediction by Rev. Dr. Whitaker, of Southold, 
closed the profitable and enjoyable meeting. There were 
sports o( various kinds at the Fair Grounds, and in the evening 
there was a very creditable display of fireworks set off on the 
south side of the river, near the water's edge, an excellent 
place for the purpose. The old lumber yard grounds, and 

51 



vicinity opposite, were filled with a large crowd of village 
residents and people who had driven in to witness the show, 
and the expressions on all sides were that the display was one 
well worth seeing. At intervals, during the exhibition, the 
Riverhead Brass Band, from a position near Hallett's Mill, 
furnished inspiring strains of patriotic music, and altogether a 
successful and satisfactory celebration was thus fittingly 
brought to a brilliant close. 




lVSKSBS^^^ library of congress 



